Weird Wednesday – Feb. 7, 2018 – A Cat, a Nerd, and a Bacteria Colony

Today’s Weird Wednesday features my cat – Deva Quinn (Day-vuh).
(Named after Anna/Carrie’s daughter on Banshee).
She is just about a year and a half old and she is just the goofiest thing. I adopted her from a cat rescue about this time last year. She sleeps in bed with me along side her two canine sisters.

What’s weird about her?
Well, for some reason the “good” bacteria colony in her belly becomes “overgrown” about once a month and she becomes lethargic, poopie, and pukey. I took her to the vet the first time this happened, which is how I got the diagnosis, and they gave her antibiotics and poop paste to stiffen that up and sent her on her way. This cost me nearly $200. Once I discovered this was going to happen every month, I had to come up with a new (less expensive) solution.

And this is where my total nerdiness kicked in.
I applied the scientific method and began to construct the first hypothesis I would try to prove. That hypothesis was, “if a woman can consume Activia probiotic yogurt to maintain a healthy digestive bacterial balance, would this also apply to a cat.”

Was it safe?
I did the research on whether Activia yogurt would be harmful to my cat, and the resources I checked not only had positive things to say about cats eating Activia yogurt (although nearly all specified plain, not flavored yogurt), they also related that a lot of cats love yogurt and look forward to a small amount as a treat every now and then.

Of course, not my cat.
Deva not only doesn’t consider Activia yogurt a treat, I’m fairly certain she believes the substance is piping hot brimstone from the very bowels of hell. My procedure for giving her a small amount of yogurt is to practically sit on top of her, hold her by the neck, dip my finger into the yogurt to get a small dab on my finger, and then proceed to pry her mouth open long enough to wipe the yogurt from my finger onto her tongue without her clamping her sharp teeth down onto my digit. And, without her spitting it back out onto the floor. I repeat this procedure until I’ve gotten three dabs of yogurt in her for two consecutive days. (Please note that at all times throughout this ordeal, Deva is safe and unharmed, which I can’t always say for myself.)

Does this procedure work?
It actually does. For the past several months, whenever Deva seems to have a relapse, I have been giving her the yogurt, and within a couple days, she’s back to her spry, crazy self.

Having proved my hypothesis into theory, I am taking my experimentation even further.
I wondered if Activia yogurt could be used as a prophylactic measure, and if by giving Deva Quinn yogurt in the same method described above BEFORE she becomes ill if this idea would keep her healthy so she didn’t have to have a couple of days of down time every month.